426 Ichthus - Kitsune - Dandelionlily - Original

[dandelionlily.livejournal.com]

Title: Kitsune
Fandom: Original
Prompt: #426 - Ichthus
Warnings: None
Rating: PG
Words: 623
Week: 2
Summary: First a mystical fox-spirit started living in our basement. Then things got kinda weird.

CONTINUED FROM LAST WEEK...

Ko snorted. “It’s not power that you lack, it’s knowledge. Experience. The kinds of things a sorcerer who creates a malicious spirit has plenty of.”

“Yeah, but he doesn’t have you,” I insisted. His expression softened a bit, then hardened again when I said, “If it’s that urgent, I’ll call Father to give us a lift.”

“Probably a good idea,” he admitted, so I knew this was really serious. Ko spent as little time as possible with my father.

Father reluctantly agreed to leave work early and pick us up in twenty minutes. Until then, Ko insisted on walking west to try to narrow down the spirit’s location. We were walking down Park Street when Ko suddenly grabbed my collar and dragged me away from the street and halfway off the sidewalk. “Whoa! Where is it?”

Ko frowned. “It’s not the spirit, I just don’t want you anywhere near that rune.” He pointed at one of the parked cars.

“Rune? Where?”

“On the bumper. It’s been formed out of some sort of metal.” Pushing me behind him, he approached the car.

“Uh, Ko? That’s a Jesus fish.” He shot me a puzzled look. “Like, Christianity. It means the person who owns the car is Christian and wants everyone to know it.”

“You think that’s a fish?”

“Everyone knows it’s a fish, Ko.”

“In that case, ‘everyone’ is wrong. Daiki, can you read the rune?”

Reading runes usually gave me a headache, but I tried my best anyway, trying to look at it and past it at once. “Uh, something about children?”

“It’ s a fertility symbol, and someone’s activated this one.”

“So if I get too close, I’ll get pregnant?” I joked.

“No, not at all. You’d have to touch it for that.”

“What?!?” My voice didn’t squeak. Much.

Ko glanced back at me. “Not this one, obviously. It’s too weak and isn’t linked with a circle or any amplification runes. Still, I’d prefer you didn’t have any help with fertility.” His gaze carried some weight, and I tried to meet it calmly. Ko had made no secret of the fact that he wanted the Minamichi line to end with me and hadn’t ruled out killing me to ensure it. It was one of the few parts of the new arrangement my mother had not accepted with equanimity. Though she never said so, I think she wanted grandkids.

“Why would someone stick an active fertility rune on a car?”

Ko frowned and sniffed at it. “It’s possible it was activated unintentionally.”

“Someone bled on it?” I asked, remembering how Ko’s blood had activated his binding wounds.

He snorted. “Fertility symbols aren’t activated by blood.” He paused for a moment, then added, “Well, maybe menstrual blood.”

“Oh gross. Ko!”

“How would you deactivate it?” he asked, and I knew he was quizzing me again.

I thought back to my lessons on breaking curses. “Um, a hollyhock whip?”

“Shattering the spell like that could have unexpected effects.”

“Eagle feathers to contain the explosion, too.”

Ko gave a thoughtful nod. “That could work, but it would use up much of your power. Sometimes you have to come at a problem from a different angle.”

That was one of Ko’s favorite phrases. He seemed to think anything could be solved if you approached it from the correct angle. “Yeah? What would you do?”

“I challenged you to deactivate it, not to destroy it.” He bit his left thumb so that a couple drops of blood welled up. He smeared a circle of blood around the Jesus fish, and I felt the way it hummed with energy, trapping the other magic.

“You’re lucky it’s a black car or they’d notice right away. They’ll still wash it off eventually.”

“So will the semen on the symbol. The solution only needs to be as permanent as the problem. Now let’s get on with the job.”